"I wish I could have lived my life like Gary Carter. He was a true man." — Darryl Strawberry

It’s extraordinary, really, when you journey back in time and ponder their snickers. Here was Gary Carter stopping to sign every single item shoved before him, and often his autograph was followed by a chat, Carter willfully engaging fans he did not know in conversation that would stick with them forever. He’d pause for pictures, coo over babies, grab these strangers’ arms and, with hands nearly as big as a catcher’s mitt, embrace them like a politician running for office.

And there were some of his teammates waiting on the bus, grumbling, mocking him. Everybody called him “Kid,” but under their breath his teammates occasionally dubbed him “Camera,” because Carter had an affair with the lens and boy, did it love him back. On the field, he never stopped encouraging every player, and in the clubhouse he never had a negative thing to say, his effervescent personality blinding, but sometimes this irked people, made them wonder about his agenda.

“It took a long while to figure it out. Gary did have a motive. He wanted people to appreciate baseball the way he did. But more than that, he was just an incredibly happy and good person. He only saw the best in people,” Darryl Strawberry said.

Grab the tissues and prepare to laugh, because the stories they’ll share Friday night at Carter’s memorial service might continue through the entire weekend. Christ Fellowship Church in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., is expecting an overflow crowd, and the services will be streamed live. Carter, the Hall of Fame catcher who died last week at 57, after a nine-month battle with brain cancer, will be remembered for his clutch hitting and ability to corral the wiliest of fastballs, but mostly he’ll be eulogized as one of those rare humans who left the world a far brighter place.

Sure, former New York Mets who attend such as Strawberry, Keith Hernandez, Rusty Staub, Wally Backman, Tim Teufel, Howard Johnson, Roger McDowell, Mookie Wilson and Sid Fernandez, might speak of how Carter often found himself in the middle of high sports drama. In particular, they might recall how Carter refused to be the last out of Game 6 of the ’86 World Series.

His fellow Hall of Famers in the audience such as Johnny Bench, Paul Molitor, Bert Blyleven, Wade Boggs, Mike Schmidt, Andre Dawson and Tony Perez undoubtedly will praise the 19-year career Carter forged, mostly with the Mets and the Montreal Expos. If Bill “Spaceman” Lee is present, he might talk about how Carter was the best defensive catcher he ever pitched to, and joke about how Carter would rush to the mound like the Energizer Bunny, all smiles and warmth even in the most dire of situations.

Lee could tell the story about how, ages ago, he nearly witnessed Carter die in spring training, when he literally ran through a wall in Winter Haven while wearing a helmet. Lee remembers cringing as they split the plastic off Carter’s head, and marveling because who runs through walls in spring training? But Carter knew only one way to play, and that was square jaw jutting, smile ablaze, full on.

It didn’t feel like a proper game if his pants weren’t stained with dirt. Then Carter would offer to clean them himself, because that’s also the sort of man he was. He hated litter, and would often walk around clubhouses or dugouts picking up gum, scraps of paper and things too gross to identify. “It’s the little things we can all do to make our time on earth memorable,” he once said, when I wondered why he was cleaning up Shea Stadium as if he worked for the grounds crew, on the day he was being honored.

Surely they’ll talk about that side of him Friday before a congregation of thousands, about how he treated ballkids with the same respect he showed managers and groveling celebrities.

Former Expos who crossed paths with Carter in his 11 years with Montreal might remember how he thrust them into the 1981 playoffs and made the club highly entertaining to watch. He taught himself French to bond with the crowds, and in return they worshipped him. Now there’s a unanimously approved motion by the Montreal city council to name a street or a place in his honor.

Nobody reveres tradition quite like Les Canadiens, and so it was that they put together a classy tribute to Carter before a recent hockey game in Montreal. Not often does an athlete from another sport get honored with such verve, but not often does there exist an athlete whose spirit transcends so many boundaries.

“Gary was so loved and respected and I think it’s because he was always the happiest guy in the place. In the world, maybe,” Mookie Wilson, his Mets teammate, told me.

Carter’s energy changed the room. Nobody knows for sure what made him so deliriously happy—some folks are just born with a cheerful optimism—but everyone agrees he lived a life he hoped would honor his mother, who died when Carter was 11.

His devotion to family was steadfast. Though he yearned to be a major league manager, once his granddaughter was born he was content coaching the baseball team at Palm Beach Atlantic University, where his daughter Kimmy Bloemers is the university’s softball coach. He immersed himself in philanthropic work, and teaching the young men who called him “Skip” to play the game the right way. Even when he was diagnosed last May with a malignant brain tumor, his memory foggy and his energy waning, he strained to keep in touch with his team.

Definitely they’ll talk about that Friday, about how on Feb. 2 he made it to opening day for the Sailfish and shook hands with each player. Severely bloated from the steroids, with the aggressive brain cancer making it difficult for Carter to even walk, he still watched about three innings and cried upon receiving a standing ovation from the crowd.

Carter was a Met for five rollicking seasons, a square peg surrounded by a circle of untamed debauchery. He didn’t smoke, rarely imbibed and while his hard-drinking teammates rushed to the bars and whatnot after the last out, Carter went home to his wife Sandy. His straight-arrow lifestyle rubbed some of the Mets wrong: they teased him, kept him at arm’s length from their raucous cliques, but he never apologized for living a pure, clean life.

“He was kind of odd man out in the clubhouse compared to what most of us were all about. His personality didn’t fit with the personalities of a lot of us because we were young and wild, we did a lot of crazy things,” Strawberry told SNY TV. “Gary Carter didn’t go out to bars drinking, Gary Carter didn’t get into fights in bars, Gary Carter wasn’t chasing women. Let’s just say it like it is: Gary Carter was what he said he was. I think a lot of people tried to look at him as being a phony because he smiled.

“He was smiling because he was free.”

Much will be mentioned at Friday’s services about Game 6 of the World Series, bottom of the 10th, New York trailing Boston 5-3, the Mets down to their last out, and how Carter came to the plate mumbling that there was no possible way the game ended with him. His single ignited one of the most improbable rallies in sports.

Soon he was charging home from second base, and when Wilson’s ground ball rolled through the legs of Bill Buckner to score the amazing winning run, there was Carter blazing out of the dugout, catcher’s gear already on, because never would he not be ready. Better believe that will be a prime topic Friday. Many will likely call him the best teammate they ever had.

“A lot of us look back and say ‘I didn’t do it the right way’,” Strawberry said. “I don’t think of (Carter) as a baseball player. He was a strong Christian, a man of faith (who) loved his family, loved his wife. He didn’t force it on us. (He just said) live right and God will bless you. (He was) a prime example of what we all want to be.”

How unfair, we want to scream, that Carter was taken first, when there were so many candidates from those ‘86 Mets who carelessly, selfishly flirted with death. Strawberry wasn’t the only member of that team who thought he was indestructible. Often it is asked what his career might have been like if drugs hadn’t interfered, same as we wonder about Dwight Gooden.

Had they lived like Carter, imagine the heights they might have soared. On the flip side, had they never met Carter, they might never have been blessed to witness a man go through life with such purposeful joy. And so the smiles should be plentiful Friday, when they bid the Kid adieu.